


raise your life a new dawn (never felt so close to home)

by andreaphobia



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Canon Compliant, Cheese toasties, Interior Decorating, Longing, M/M, Sort Of, Vignette, Wings, remembering, sleepover
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-16
Updated: 2019-06-16
Packaged: 2020-05-12 18:38:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,751
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19234849
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/andreaphobia/pseuds/andreaphobia
Summary: In which Crowley and Aziraphale share a moment, the night the world is remade.Or: the one where Aziraphale sleeps over.





	raise your life a new dawn (never felt so close to home)

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to [Tumblr](https://andreaphobia.tumblr.com/post/180727310582/the-thought-of-aziraphale-being-in-crowleys-flat) for deets on the statue in Crowley's flat. o>
> 
> Title adapted from a very lovely Vienna Teng song.
> 
> Thanks for everything, Pterry.

 

 

“It burned down, remember?”

Judging by the look of slowly-dawning realisation on the angel’s face, he hadn’t. Under normal circumstances, Crowley enjoyed being the bearer of bad news, but this—this was a bit different. He coughed.

“You can stay at my place, if you like,” he said. Nice and casual, he thought. Easy does it with angels; you wouldn’t want to startle them. “Have a kip on the sofa, or something like that.”

Aziraphale blinked a few times. (He seemed a little distracted, possibly because he was still working on clearing from his mind the thought of the collection that was his life’s work, all gone up in smoke.) Then he frowned a little.

“Have you even got a sofa? I will admit it’s been a while since my last visit, but I don’t recall there being much in the way of furniture about the place. You did have some _very_ nice greenery, though—”

“Could have one,” said Crowley quickly, before Aziraphale could spend too much time pondering the potential reasons for the luxuriousness of his house plants. “You probably just forgot.” Actually, at that moment, he didn’t have a sofa. He’d gotten rid of his last one during his most recent bout of redecorating (at which Aziraphale had smiled politely, calling it a cross between a very modern bathroom and the inside of a prison cell). But that was nothing that couldn’t be fixed.

“And stop trying to tempt me,” Aziraphale continued, in the stern tone that Crowley knew meant he was trying not to smile. Better than him moping on about his own personal Alexandria, at least. Although all things considered, Crowley thought he was handling things quite well. Not that he’d expected any weeping or gnashing of teeth or anything like that, Aziraphale wasn’t the sort—but those weren’t the only ways one could grieve. “Besides,” he went on—and here there was a little self-conscious glance tossed off to the side, like a thing to be ashamed of, “I don’t think my side would like that.”

Crowley looked at him.

“You don’t have a side anymore. Neither of us do.” He looked at Aziraphale some more. “We’re on our own side.”

Sometimes, he thought it would’ve been nice if he and Aziraphale could see eye to eye. If they could really _look_ at each other, and not just through the dark glasses that were a perpetual fixture on his face. Then, perhaps, the angel might have understood that what he was really trying to say was, _I’m on_ your _side_.

But that was soppy as all out, so he would never say it, not the way he meant it. (Besides, he wasn’t enough of a twerp to keep taking them off whenever they had a moment, and then putting them on again when they were done.)

He hailed the bus that was ostensibly headed for Oxford city centre, and they got on together. The angel slid into the seat next to him, natural as anything—which, he supposed, after the first couple of millennia, it essentially became. He cleared his throat.

“Regardless, the offer stands. You can get off at my stop, if you like. Or not. It’s up to you.”

Aziraphale was still quite pale. Crowley wondered if this meant that the weeping and rending of garments was happening on the inside, but decided it was best not to ask. He looked sideways at Aziraphale, and Aziraphale looked back at him with a quiet, private sorrow in his eyes. At last, he gave a little shudder, and then a long sigh.

“You know, I… I suppose I might as well,” he said, lightly.

Crowley smiled.

*

There was just the slightest of problems with having invited Aziraphale over, but this was something that Crowley only remembered when he pulled the front door open and caught the faint whiff of burning sulphur. Shit, _Ligur_. What with everything _else_ that had been going on, he’d forgotten entirely about it.

Before Aziraphale could set one foot into flat, Crowley cut neatly in front of him and then swung around, pulling the door most of the way shut and flashing a nervous grin at him through the gap.

“Hang on a moment—you, er, wait right here. I’ve just got to… I need to take care of some… things.”

“Really, now, Crowley? You needn’t tidy up for little old me,” said Aziraphale, although he sounded oddly pleased about it. Through the door, Crowley heard him starting to hum _Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring_ under his breath. He rolled his eyes and stalked down the hall, towards the place where the late Ligur had met his timely end.

“Oh, it’s no trouble at all, honest,” he called over his shoulder. Then he stopped short, regarding in horror the tangled mess of tacky leather coat and red plastic bucket and… other… otherworldly substances… that had all melted together to create a very avant-garde welcome mat adorning the door to his office. He cleared it away with the sweep of a hand, but found that unfortunately, the stench still lingered. He began cycling through a number of Air Wick scents, before finally settling on one of the ambiguously outdoorsy ones—strong enough to cover up the smell of deep-fried demon, but not cloying. (Besides, he thought, anything fruity or spicy would have been pandering.)

Then there was the matter of the sofa, which didn’t yet exist. The problem was, most of their social visits seemed to take place at the bookshop, and not his flat. Which, now that he was thinking about it, was probably not unrelated. Crowley’s office had a television mounted on the wall, sure, but it wasn’t exactly a place for a cup of tea and a biscuit. Besides, this wasn’t _work_. On the spur of the moment he decided that the space next to the kitchen would make do, for a living area. (Normally, he wouldn’t have been so blasé about whipping things up out of thin air, but he figured that tonight, out of all the nights he’d ever been on Earth, he could be certain that head office was busy with _other_ things.)

He strolled out from the office to the gleaming, unused, modern kitchen, and gave it a _look_ , upon which it immediately decided to fill itself with food, of the sort that might or might not have been of comfort to a grieving angel. Then he glared at the empty space by the window, which contracted suddenly, then resolved itself into a loveseat, a squashy armchair, and a coffee table at just the right height. None of it quite matched the rest of the decor, but it wasn’t as if there was enough time to get an interior designer in and ask for pointers.

Almost as an afterthought, two mugs of tea landed on top of the table with a quiet ‘clink’. Wine seemed inappropriate, given the occasion, but Crowley decided a couple of nips of whiskey in the tea might help take the edge off things.

Then he took a step back and saw everything that he had made, and it was very good. He went to let Aziraphale in.

“Thank you, my dear,” said Aziraphale, stepping inside. As he did so he very carefully avoided looking at the sculpture in the foyer, the one which they never, ever discussed[1]. He followed Crowley into the newly-minted living room, and then stared around the space, and at the steam rising up from the mugs which Crowley had just remembered to warm up to the perfect temperature. His lips parted a little into a little ‘o’ of befuddlement.

“Well, it seems I must stand corrected,” he said slowly. “I’d thought that you lived in a… a… sterile… concrete jungle, of sorts. But this is quite domestic, isn’t it? You could almost sit in that armchair!”

“Almost,” Crowley echoed, collapsing into said armchair wearily. He picked up his mug and drank, and Aziraphale, after seating himself primly in the centre of the loveseat, followed suit. For a while it was quiet, which suited Crowley just fine. He was suddenly very tired. He looked down into the bottom of his mug, which was already empty, and watched it fill itself up again. His thoughts were wandering every which way, without any conscious input from him. All those _blessed_ prophecies. His beloved Bentley, burnt to a crisp. That Adam boy, and the terrible way his voice had seemed to seep into the very foundations of the Earth; the ground splitting and Lucifer himself pouring out from within…

“…ley. Crowley?”

Crowley jumped, then looked up, momentarily slack-jawed.

“Wha’?”

Aziraphale was watching him, with a characteristically gentle look on his face.

“I just asked if you were all right. You… well. You look like you could use a bit of a lie-down.”

“Me? I’m _fine_ ,” Crowley scoffed. “Worry about yourself for a change, why don’t you?”

“Well, that’s what I have you for,” said Aziraphale, without missing a beat. He smiled, too, and Crowley felt a bloody irritating rush of squishy warm feelings that he hurriedly beat back with an imaginary stick before they could get out of hand. He tossed his mug down on the table with a clatter, and got up, starting to pace so that he wouldn’t have to think in general, or look at Aziraphale in specific.

“What d’you suppose is going to happen now?” he asked the ceiling.

“I haven’t the faintest idea.” There was a rustle of paper. Aziraphale had drawn the scrap of prophecy from his breast pocket, and was smoothing it out thoughtfully. “Though I expect that it will have something to do with this.” He studied it for a moment more, then sighed, and placed it on the table. “But we can sort that out later; I’m not quite in the mood at the moment. Do you… have anything to eat, by the way? I’m feeling a little…”

Crowley waved vaguely in the direction of the pantry, as if to say _Have at it_ , which Aziraphale was all too glad to do. For a while, Crowley just looked out of the window at moonlit rooftops, listening to the sounds of the angel pottering around the kitchen making himself at home. Cabinets were discreetly opened and closed, and each time Aziraphale couldn’t help but express his surprise at the selection of edibles within.

“You know, I never would’ve taken you for a marmalade man. Er… demon,” he said, at one point.

Crowley was not a “marmalade man”; in fact, he hadn’t had any at all until about fifteen minutes ago, but there was no need to tell Aziraphale that. He only shrugged, and kept staring out the window at nothing. He seemed to have worked himself into a strange sort of mood.

He couldn’t seem to stop thinking about the desert of time, that windswept and desolate dune where he’d stolen a moment for them to be able to speak to Adam, alone. It’d been such an incredibly long time since he’d seen Aziraphale like that, with wings out, in his full celestial glory. There just wasn’t much reason for it these days, what with the invention of lifts and commercial air travel and whatnot. And more’s the pity, thought Crowley, for the sight of them got him feeling oddly sentimental. Brought back fond memories, it did, of far simpler times. Which was probably a shameful thing for any self-respecting demon to feel, but fortunately Crowley wasn’t the sort to be bothered about what other demons thought—especially tonight.

“Your… your wings.”

Aziraphale glanced up, blinking, from the cheese toastie he was labouring over. “I’m sorry?”

Crowley cleared his throat. He hadn’t meant to say that out loud, but he didn’t think Aziraphale would appreciate him attempting a Jedi mind-trick to make him forget. “Your, um, wings. I was just thinking about them. Hadn’t seen you with them, in… a while.”

“Oh.” Aziraphale’s brow knit slightly. “No, I suppose not.” He didn’t go on, but the question hung in the air, anyway.

Unable to find the words for what he was thinking or what he meant, Crowley instead waved a hand at the cheese toastie on the plate, which immediately grilled itself to perfection. Aziraphale, who was easily distracted by the smell of food, looked down in pleasant surprise.

“Oh. Why, thank you.” Beaming, he picked it up and began to polish it off, and Crowley simply watched, with some small part of him vicariously enjoying the angel’s gluttony. Unfortunately, the distraction only lasted as long as the life-span of a sandwich; when Aziraphale was finished, he wiped the crumbs from his hands and mouth fastidiously, straightened his bow tie, and then looked back at Crowley as if to say, _Well?_

Crowley had no idea.

Then he had one idea. He hesitated, then reached up and pulled off the dark glasses. In doing so, he had to narrow his eyes a bit against the light, dim as it was. (After all, one got used to the world in shade, after all those centuries. Your first foray back into the light could be blinding.)

He just looked at Aziraphale, saying nothing, but willing for him to understand. As though just wishing for it might be enough to bring on a round of divine inspiration, something that would spare Crowley the shame of having to verbalise any of his terribly undemonic thoughts. He hadn’t actually expected anything of the sort to happen, but after nearly a solid minute of just looking at each other, Aziraphale said, “Oh.”

And then he blushed, which was quite alarming. Crowley hurriedly put the dark glasses back on.

“I mean, you don’t have to or anything,” said Crowley hastily. “I wasn’t _asking_. I was just—”

But Aziraphale didn’t seem to be listening. He was peering thoughtfully around the kitchen, as though for all the world trying to decide whether he liked bare concrete walls as an architectural style.

“Not much room in here, is there?” he said, briskly. “I wouldn’t want to knock anything over. I don’t suppose you’ve got another room where we could…?”

Crowley hesitated. For some reason, he felt rather as though they were venturing into dangerous territory. Here be dragons, that sort of thing. (But then again, if he’d had better judgement, he mightn’t have ended up the way he was in the first place.)

“The—erm. There’s some room in the bedroom. I think.”

It was his turn to nearly blush at the look Aziraphale gave him. (Though it hardly showed; it was a good job he was cold-blooded.) “I didn’t mean it like _that_ , you stupid… Oh, just forget it, will you? It wasn’t even a—”

The insult of being invited to a demon’s bedroom remained, but all the same, Aziraphale’s expression began to soften.

“No, it’s… it’s quite all right, actually.” Aziraphale gave his hands a considering look, and then nodded, more to himself than anything else. “Let’s try it, then.”

*

The bedroom was one of the sections of his flat that Aziraphale hadn’t seen yet—at least, not in this particular iteration of his domicile[2]. It was quite, quite dark, and very modern, in keeping with the rest of the decor. There was a bizarrely-shaped block of marble that served as a bedside table, and a lamp carved entirely out of black metal. The pillowcases were black, the bedding was black, and the bed-frame was wrought iron, painted a most striking shade of gunmetal grey—which, to the less discerning eye, might have been perceived as black.

He wasn’t looking at Aziraphale for approval or an opinion, but Aziraphale seemed to think he wanted one, anyway.

“It’s very nice.” Aziraphale was wearing the dubious smile of one who is trying very hard to come up with something nice to say—and failing—but by God, he would say it anyway. “Very… um… dark.”

Crowley scowled. “It’s restful. Like nighttime.”

“Yes, I can see how one might, erm, come to that conclusion.” Gingerly, Aziraphale sat down on the edge of the bed, which gave slightly against his weight. “Well.” He shut his eyes, breathed in, and then out again. And as he did so, the breath that he exhaled seemed to suffuse the room with a cosy glow.

It was incredibly strange watching someone else manifest their wings. Crowley had never given it much thought, since he hardly had a use for them these days[3]. He couldn’t help but take a step back as the light grew and swelled, brighter and brighter and brighter still and then he blinked, and it had all coalesced into the pair of wings which sprouted forth from Aziraphale’s shoulder-blades, folded in tightly against his back.

Aziraphale opened his eyes again.

“Is this what you meant?” he asked, as casually as though Crowley had asked him for the time.

Crowley remembered to close his mouth. (Somewhere deep in the recesses of his mind, this thought surfaced: a fine sheen of water coating soft feathers, wingtips dewy from the first rain. The memory of it was, somehow, inextricably tied up with a sense of longing.)

He took a step forward, towards Aziraphale.

“Could I…?”

“What? Oh. Er.” Aziraphale looked flustered. “I mean… I don’t see why not. But Crowley…”

He trailed off, unable to conceive of a way that Crowley might be dissuaded, when he looked like _that_.

And then Crowley was there. He began—with the same air of anticipation with which a child might unwrap presents on Christmas morning—to card his fingertips through Aziraphale’s wingfeathers, from the roots of the pinions all the way down to the tips. The very first touch was light, as ticklish as a sneeze; Aziraphale made an incoherent sound which was quickly stifled by a hand.

Crowley smirked.

Under his hands, Aziraphale’s wings were grand, and quite enormous, as they proportionally had to be for something the size of a human. But overall, basically identical in structure to the sort of wing you might see on a much smaller creature—say, the kind that might end up breaded and extra-crispy in a paper bucket. All of God’s creatures, Crowley thought wryly; made of the same mould, from the same clay. (And for a moment, because his subconscious mind couldn’t seem to give up heresy, he could almost have dared to put himself in the same category. Almost, but not quite.)

And as his hands moved, as his fingers worked, he began to remember. Not prophecies, not things like the earth turning to powder beneath their feet, but more… distant things. Memories from as far back as one could go: before the Agreement, before Aziraphale, long before even the Earth. It wasn’t that he could barely remember them—it was more that he’d actually forgotten, or at least buried them so deep as for it to be the same thing. A time and a place where others had groomed his wings, in just this same way, where they’d all huddled together for warmth when they rested, and…

Useless, pitiful, pointless thoughts. He shook his head slightly to clear it, and then leaned forward.

“You doing all right, there?”

“Mmmhm,” said Aziraphale, muzzily. The combination of warm tea, a cheese toastie, and a wing massage seemed to be doing a number on him. In the meantime Crowley had moved on, now starting to rub the tension from the ligaments near Aziraphale’s shoulders in slow circles.

He was, it had to be said, rather enjoying this newfound privilege of touch. (He very carefully did not think about certain things, like about how foolish angels could be, and how easily he could have hurt an angel whose wings were literally in his hands. They simply didn’t bear thinking about.)

Finally, several long minutes later, when he had finished working his way from the base of the wing to the tip, leaving no feather untouched, Crowley sat back. Aziraphale’s eyes were half-closed, and he drifted back and forth where he sat slowly, as though swaying along to a tune only he could hear. He looked a fair bit more relaxed than he had half an hour ago. Given that this had been Crowley’s ultimate goal, he figured that was a job well done, at least.

“Angel?” said Crowley, softly.

Aziraphale didn’t answer.

One of the good things about being a demon, Crowley thought, was that you never had to feel guilty for doing exactly what you wanted. All the same, though, there was a moment of hesitation before he leaned forward, towards Aziraphale’s shoulder and into his side, drawing closer and closer until he was nearly, but not quite, huddled against him. He couldn’t quite remember how it was done, or where he should put his hands. He guessed that he was doing it all wrong, and then wanted to laugh at the very thought.

But Aziraphale neither budged, nor voiced a protest. Instead, he softened against Crowley, going pliant. There was a gentle warmth emanating from him, like some sort of ridiculous new-age aura or something. Crowley startled as something soft folded half around him, then realised it was a sleepy wing, tucking him closer. He was surprised, and then even more surprisingly, comforted. The sensation of it was both familiar and unfamiliar; it was foreign, and it felt like home.

He shut his eyes, and let a breath out in a quiet hiss. There’d be plenty of time in the morning, to deal with the aftermath of it all. For now, their work was finished, and so he would rest.

*

_Footnotes:_

[1] It was a statue of—let us say—Good and Evil wrestling, with Evil triumphing. (At least, that was one of many possible interpretations.) Crowley had vague memories of them buying it drunk while at an auction, and then waking up the next day to find it sitting in his front hall, without further explanation. He’d ended up quite liking it in an ironic sort of way, and now he was just waiting to see who would crack and bring it up first. [go back]

[2] On the other hand he’d gotten quite used to Crowley’s bedroom in the 1300’s. Given that Crowley had tried his damnedest to sleep through the entirety of the century, that was the only place he could ever be found. [go back]

[3] Although sometimes he thought about putting up a bat signal and going for a nighttime jaunt, just for laughs. [go back]

 

**Author's Note:**

> Comments and kudos always appreciated!
> 
> It's taken me more than ten years to write my very first Good Omens fic, but I would like to write more, if I can. I'd especially like to make some new Good Omens friends, if you've got ideas to toss my way. :) I'm on [Tumblr](http://andreaphobia.tumblr.com) and [Twitter](http://twitter.com/andreaphobia).


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